This healthy homemade granola recipe is packed with oats, coconut, pecans and spices. Delicious crunchy granola clusters are the best for snacking or breakfast!
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Easy Granola Recipe
This healthy homemade granola recipe is one I enjoy every day. Made with simple pantry staples like oats, nuts, seeds, and natural sweeteners, it’s an easy recipe just like my oatmeal breakfast bars, homemade granola bars and no-bake breakfast cookies.
Granola is one of my favorite healthy snacks. It tastes amazing for breakfast in a yogurt bowl, smoothies, oatmeal or overnight oats and even plain. It’s perfectly crunchy with lots of clusters, just the right amount of sweet taste and way better than store-bought!
Why I Love This Healthy Granola
- Healthier. After purchasing many bags of store-bought granola, I found that making a homemade healthy granola recipe is much better as I can control the ingredients and added sugar.
- Stays fresh for a long. Granola will stay good up to a month. Top baked apples or peaches for a snack or add to breakfast popsicles!
Ingredients
Find the full printable recipe with specific measurements below.
- Basic granola recipe: Simple ingredients including old-fashioned whole rolled oats (not quick-cooking oats), canola oil (or melted coconut oil), honey (or maple syrup), vanilla extract and cinnamon.
- Brown sugar: This adds natural sweetness to my easy homemade granola recipe. Feel free to omit for a less sweet version.
- Coconut: Unsweetened coconut flakes are always delicious and give a light and tasty texture and flavor.
- Pecans: I love adding hearty nuts that can add in protein as well.
How to Make Homemade Granola
Mix ingredients together. In a large mixing bowl, stir all dry ingredients together until combined. Spread granola mixture in an even layer onto the parchment paper lined jelly roll pan or baking sheet.
Bake granola. Bake the granola at 300°F for 7 minutes, then remove it from the oven and stir. Place back in the oven and bake for 7-8 more minutes. Remove, stir and let cool.
Recipe Variations and Healthy Substitutions
- Chocolate: Make it little sweeter ingredient with white or chocolate chips. Even peanut butter chips are delicious! Add after removing from the oven.
- Dried fruit: Dried apricots, dried cranberries, golden raisins, or dried cherries are chewy and delicious. Add after baking to avoid burning in oven.
- Different nuts: Try almonds, peanuts, or walnuts for classic nuts. If you are more adventurous try it with sunflower seeds, pistachios, or pumpkin seeds.
- Small seeds: Chia seeds and flax seeds not only add crunch but are rich in omega-3’s, healthy fats and fiber.
- Low sugar: Omit or decrease the added brown sugar.
- Vegan: Use real maple syrup in equal amounts for the honey.
- Gluten free: Use certified gluten-free oats. They will still need to be rolled oats.
- Seasoning: Cinnamon or ground ginger, or pumpkin spice will add warm flavor.
Best Granola Recipe Tips
If you love crunchy clusters in your homemade granola, follow these tips!
- Press down evenly into the pan for the first 7 minutes of cooking. This encourages clusters to form. After stirring, press down again to make clumpy granola.
- Stir granola halfway through baking time. This helps distribute the middle to the edges so they get crisp without any soft spots.
- Cool completely before breaking into pieces. As it cools it will continue to get crisp.
- Add dried fruit after it has cooled. You want the dried fruit to stay soft and chewy.
- Combine cooled granola with fresh fruit or fresh berries and Greek yogurt to make a yogurt parfait (my favorite for a healthy breakfast!).
- To store, add granola to an airtight container, bag or mason jar for up to 1 month at room temperature or store frozen up to 2 months.
More healthy snack ideas include: Honey nut cheerios peanut butter bars, baked oatmeal, or kale smoothie.
More Snack Recipes
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Homemade Granola
Video
Ingredients
- 5 cups rolled old fashioned oats
- ⅔ cup melted coconut oil , or canola oil
- ½ cup honey
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ cup light brown sugar
- ½ cup coconut
- ½ cup chopped nuts (I prefer a mix of cashews, almonds or pecans)
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Optional mix in's: Additional nuts, seeds or craisins (I love adding in 1/2 cup golden berry blend from TJ)
Instructions
- Prep. Preheat oven to 300°F. Line or grease a 15×18 jelly roll pan and set aside.
- Combine. Mix 5 cups old-fashioned oats, melted coconut oil, honey, vanilla extract, salt, brown sugar, coconut, nuts and cinnamon in a large bowl and stir until combined. Spread granola mixture out evenly onto a greased jelly roll pan.
- Bake. Bake for 7 minutes. Remove from oven and stir. Put back in the oven for 7-10 more minutes or until it reaches desired crunchiness. It will harden more as it cools, so be careful not to burn. Remove from oven, stir and let cool.
- Store. Store granola in an airtight container.
Notes
- chocolate chips (wait to add until after baking)
- chopped dried fruit
- extra nuts such as macadmia nuts or walnuts
- chia seeds, cinnamon
Nutrition
Nutrition provided is an estimate. It will vary based on specific ingredients used.
Did you make this recipe? Don’t forget to give it a star rating below!
Categorized as: American, Breakfast, Dairy-Free, Meal Prep, Snacks, Vegetarian
Jamielyn Nye is the founder and recipe creator at I Heart Naptime. She is the author of the I Heart Naptime Cookbook and shares easy family-friendly recipes and desserts for every occasion.
Turned out great!
So glad you enjoyed the homemade granola recipe!
Delicious!!!!!
Thanks for the review!
This is the best granola! I have used it for snacks, on top of yogurt, and even ice cream! It has been so perfect to store and have on hand.
So happy to hear you have found multiple uses for it!
This homemade granola recipe is awesome. It is so easy to make and tastes so good, no more buying granola!
So glad you enjoyed it!
This granola recipe is so delicious, better than any store bought granola I’ve tried. I used maple syrup instead of honey, and I didn’t use any vanilla, and it was still very flavorful. This is my go to recipe now for granola. My whole family enjoyed it. Thank you!
This makes me so happy to hear! I’m so glad you and your family enjoy the granola Angie!
Delicious!
Thanks for the review!
Could not love this granola more! SO easy to make and so delicious. Cannot wait to make this again!
Glad to hear you enjoy it!
Is the coconut shredded unsweetened or sweetened?
You can use either depending on how sweet you like your granola.
Perfect granola! It really does crunch up after cooling so thanks for the note about not overcooking.
Wow – was this sweet! too sweet for me. To balance it, I would add more oats and slightly more oil or cut way down on the honey / brown sugar.
Other than that, it was very easy to make and looks wonderful.
The flavor was good but it took way longer than it said in the recipe. After cooling down, it’s still not as crunchy as I would like.
Hi Molly, I’m glad you enjoyed the flavor. If you prefer it crunchier, you can also cook a few minutes longer, just make sure to stir so it doesn’t burn (I prefer mine softer which is the time mentioned).
This was the first time I made my own granola and I will never buy granola again. This is delicious! Thank you.
I’m so glad you enjoyed the granola Cheryl!
Love it, but just wondering if it is ok to refrigerate this?
You can refrigerate this granola but can be stored at room temperature too.
The recipe is very simple to put together. Very tasty even before cooking. Due to food allergies, I substituted the coconut oil / Canola oil with avocado oil. I hate it the honey and oil before pouring into dry ingredients. Not sure if this helped the oats absorb the flavor. Highly recommend
This was my first time making granola. It was so easy to make and way cheaper than store bought. I love that it doesn’t contain cornstarch, cornsyrup or seed oils. This will be my go to recipe for granola. I made it with only almonds and coconut add ins and it tasted just like honey bunches of oats cereal. Delicious! Thank you for sharing this.
I reduced the amount of honey to 1/4 cup, but should have halved the brown sugar, too. So sweet!
First time making homemade granola and chose this recipe. Will never buy store bought again. So delicious!
I did not know how many servings it was but over all it was good